helix2301 writes: "Speaking to Wired’s Michael V. Copeland at the TED 2013 conference currently taking place in Long Beach, Hillis argues that because so many interconnected systems are now reliant on the world wide web, “We’re setting ourselves up for disaster, like we did with the financial system.” Pointing to examples like the Stuxnet virus, US military data being routed through China, and the threat of a massive denial of service attack targeting the entire web, Hillis advocates building a second backbone that would kick in like a back-up generator “when the internet is in trouble.”"